So what did Kim Clijsters get for winning the US Open? Well, beside from the big paychecks, she got slapped down the rankings to three spots.
Maybe it's time for the WTA and ATP Tour to award bonus points if a player successfully defend his/her title; especially, at the slam. For example, the WTA should have awarded Clijsters half of the 2,000 championship points she could have gotten had she not won it last year.
So 1,000 points for the Belgian for winning it. Just give players half of the ranking bonus points for successful getting into the round they were in the tournament in the previous year.
This would help solve the ranking problem for a bit.